It comes as Cabinet ministers consider introducing fines for people who gather on the street to have take-away pints.
It’s after footage emerged on social media of large numbers of people drinking on the streets of Cork and Dublin over the weekend.
But Mary Lou McDonald believes fines are a knee jerk reaction and common sense is needed.
"If it's going to be a business of issuing fines for people drinking pints on the streets, well then, what do we about everybody who's meeting up and drinking coffee. You know, I think there needs to be a little bit of common sense here. I think our better course of action, instead of taking the big stick and talking about fine, is just to speak to people's common sense.
